The Other McCain

"One should either write ruthlessly what one believes to be the truth, or else shut up." — Arthur Koestler

‘When You Give in to Thuggery’

Posted on | April 26, 2011 | 8 Comments

The situation with King & Spalding dropping its client — Congress — in defending the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) before Supreme Court was not something I felt co?mpelled to write about yesterday. But it is pointed out that King & Spalding dropped the case under pressure from gay activists, which means that there will be further such intimidation: “That’s what happens when you give in to thuggery,” as Professor Reynolds says.

And it’s the thuggery that is so obnoxious. Gay rights activists are so full of their own righteousness that they don’t give a damn about what means they employ to achieve their ends. Generally speaking, honorable ends are not advanced by dishonorable means. If you have to lie, steal, cheat and kill to achieve your goal — if it cannot be achieved without such methods — this is kind of a large flashing neon sign to warn you that there is something wrong with your goal.

There is something very unusual about the rapidity of this political shift, as Byron York points out:

Amid all the threatening and the name calling, one thing was clear. In the furtherance of its political position, the Obama administration has abdicated the Justice Department’s traditional responsibility to defend laws passed by Congress, and now King & Spalding has abdicated the lawyer’s responsibility to represent a client. And they did it over a law that passed with huge bipartisan majorities in a Republican House and Senate, was signed by a Democratic president, and was defended by two Democratic administrations and one Republican one.

Just 15 years ago, in other words, there was a massive majoritarian consensus against same-sex marriage. Then came the Lawrence v. Texas ruling in 2003, then Massachusetts legalized same-sex marriage in 2004 (thanks, Mitt Romney!)  and then . . . well, the deluge.

The fantastical project of yesterday, which was mentioned only to be ridiculed, is today the audacious reform, and will be tomorrow the accomplished fact.
— R.L. Dabney, 1897

The stunning rapidity with which the gay-rights movement has vanquished all opposition — so that now one cannot speak against their agenda without being accused of “hate” — is perhaps unprecedented. It  is certainly remarkable, and all the more so because the “rights” asserted are without any basis in Anglo-American legal tradition, as I explained in my 2008 American Spectator column, “Gay Rights, Gay Rage.”

In abandoning the mooring of the common-law tradition, we have pulled up anchor and set sail into uncharted waters, where the legend on the map reads, “Here Be Dragons.”

UPDATE: Dan at Gay Patriot engages in a thought-experiment about anti-discrimination laws.

It is important to understand that the heart of the question raised by the King & Spalding decision is not whether we approve or disapprove of homosexuality, or even whether we support or oppose the legalization of same-sex marriage. What is at issue is whether the concept of “gay rights” should empower advocates of that agenda to bully and intimidate their critics. You may wish to compare this to how the Left smeared Amy Alkon.

Category: Gays

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